Abstract
Enhancing resource productivity is effective to improve trade-off between the environment and economy. For minimizing consumption of natural resources required for economic activities, it is necessary to strengthen both material recycling and energy utilization, which reduce final disposal amount and return waste to economic activities as resource.This study seeks to clarify environmental economic policy for promoting establishment of sound material-cycle society subject to keeping or expanding the regional economic scale, and enhancing the amount of material recycling and reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Study area is Tokyo metropolitan area. To reduce GHG emissions and final disposal amount, we consider promoting both material recycling and energy utilization thoroughly. Under these circumstances, we construct an expanded input-output model. The model includes the flows of waste and energy, and emissions of GHG. With restrictions on GHG emissions, Gross Regional Product (GRP) is maximized as the objective function. We quantitatively analyze how much tax and subsidy on discharging waste is required for sound material-cycle society along with analysis on effects of the policy by model simulation.The results show that, with 10 yen/kg tax on discharging waste, final disposal amount per GRP was 11% lower than the baseline case.
Highlights
In the 1960s, during so-called high-growth period, economic activities in Japan were based on mass-production, mass-consumption and mass-disposal
Gross Regional Product (GRP) and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) fell down as we tighten up greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions restriction
We clarified the effects of thorough waste recycling on economy and environment
Summary
In the 1960s, during so-called high-growth period, economic activities in Japan were based on mass-production, mass-consumption and mass-disposal. This social structure initiated many environmental issues such as depletion of natural resources, shortage of landfill site and excessive emission of pollutants including GHG along with outbreak of four major environmental pollutions in Japanese history. In Tokyo, majority of waste is incinerated and the ash goes to landfill site (Bureau of Environment, 2014). There are more efficient methods for biomass such as methane fermentation and conversion into biodiesel fuel (BDF). If we use these methods, we can achieve higher resource productivity
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